Pages

Friday, June 12, 2009

Happiness Production: our garden the second week of June

From an article on the economist Wilhelm Ropke in the Spring 2009 Intercollegiate Review:

Indeed, Ropke held an almost religious faith in the transformative power of the private garden. As he wrote, the keeping of a family garden "was not only 'the purists of human pleasures' but also offers the indispensable natural foundation for family life and the bringing up of children."

Ropke tells the story of a laissez-faire liberal who saw the family gardens of several workers. Ropke continued,

"on seeing these happy people spending their free evening in their garden, the laissez-faire liberal "could think of nothing better than the cool remark this was an irrational form of vegetable production."

Ropke retorted, "He could not get it into his head that [the garden] was a very rational form of 'happiness production' which surely is what matters most."

I thought I'd showcase our vertical frames that we built to grow as much as we can in small spaces and keep produce out of the dirt. They were inexpensive, especially compared to large tomato cages, easy to make and a means of happiness production for us!

Here they are and it's only the second week of June:

Summer Squash and 4 cucumber plants in just 4 squares

32 pea plants in 4 squares

Indeterminate Tomatoes, grow 1 per square

Pole Beans growing up our homemade tee-pee made from an old curtain rod and twine

Other newcomers:

Our Nasturtium has started to blossom. These edible flowers look lovely in a salad:

And we have replanted 8 squares with more radishes, bush beans, lettuce and spinach and they are already sprouting. The sprouts make it feel like April again: